a ee 
Melaleuca. POLYADELPHIA POLYANDRIA. 395 
ing plants of the tree; Dr. Fleming therefore gave Mr. Smith 
strict orders to be very careful to get the proper sort, two or 
three being mentioned by Rumphius, from which the best 
oil was obtained. This commission Mr, 8. executed to our 
satisfaction, many thriving plants having been sent to the 
garden by the close of the year, where they continue to grow 
freely, and in six and seven years they began to blossom at 
various times of the year, which they have hitherto continu- 
ed to do, and to ripen their seeds perfectly. From them 
numerous plants have been reared, and not only distributed 
over many parts of the continent of India, but sent to various 
other quarters of the world. It is from the original young 
trees, now (18] 1,) thirteen years old, that the following de- 
scription, and the accompanying figures are taken. 
Trunk tolerably erect, but crooked ; and slender for the 
age of the trees. Bark of a very light or whitish ash-colour, 
soft, thick, and spongy, pretty smooth on the surface, the ex- 
terior lamina peels off from time to time in thin flakes, like that 
of the birch tree ; and the interior part may be separated into 
numerous lamina, like the leaves of a book. Branches scat- 
tered, with the slender twigs often drooping as completely 
as in the weeping willow, they are round and smooth ; young 
shoots sericeous ; height of the young trees (thirteen years,) 
above mentioned about twelve feet, and the thickest part of 
the trunk not more than a man’s leg, including the bark, 
which is three quarters of an inch thick. Leaves alternate, 
projecting in every direction, but most frequently vertical, 
short-petioled,narrow-lanceolar, while young sericeous, some- 
times slightly falcate, entire ; from three to five inches long, 
and from half to three quarters of an inch broad ; on bemg 
bruised they smell strong of the balsam they yield, yet the 
cells which contain this aromatic fluid, are scarcely visible in 
the fresh leaves, Spikes terminal, and from the extreme axills, 
downy, while in flower there is only a scaly conic bud at the 
apex, which soon advances into a leafy branchlet. Brae- 
tes solitary, lanceolate, sericeous, three-flowered, caducous. 
Xx2 
